“By the law approved (_Terrien_, Lib. XII, Cap. 37), torture is to be used, though not upon slight presumption, yet where the presumptive proof is strong, and much more when the proof is positive, and there wants only the confession of the party accused. Yet this practice of torturing does not appear to have been used in the Island for some ages, except in the case of witches, when it was too frequently applied, near a century since. The custom then was, when any person was supposed guilty of sorcery or witchcraft, they carried them to a place in the town called _La Tour Beauregard_, and there, tying their hands behind them by the two thumbs, drew them to a certain height, with an engine made for that purpose, by which means sometimes their shoulders were turned round, and sometimes their thumbs torn off; but this fancy of witches has for some years been laid aside.” [160] EDITOR’S NOTE.--Mary Osgood, one of the “Salem Witches” tried in 1692, confessed that “when in a melancholy condition she saw the appearance of a cat at the end of the house, which cat proved to be the Devil himself.” See _Demonology and Devil-Lore_, Vol. II., p. 315. [161] The Witches’ Sabbath being a travesty of all Christian holy rites and ceremonies, the “black ointment” evidently represented the chrism. [162] EDITOR’S NOTE.--“It is an example of the completeness and consistency with which a theory may organise its myth, that the fatal demons are generally represented as abhorring salt,--the preserving agent against decay.… The Devil, as heir of death-demons, appears in all European folk-lore as a hater of salt.” _Demonology and Devil-Lore_, by Moncure Conway, Vol. I., p. 288. [163] EDITOR’S NOTE.--Susanne de Quetteville, daughter of Jehannet de Quetteville and his wife Colliche de Sausmarez, was born in 1586, married the Rev. Jean Perchard in 1611, and died in 1612. WIZARDS AND WITCHES. There are some families in Guernsey whose members have the reputation of being sorcerers from their birth. These individuals require no initiation into the diabolic mysteries of the “Sabbat,” Satan claiming them as his own from the very cradle. They are, however, furnished by him with a familiar, generally in the shape of a fly, so that the phrase “_avoir une mouque_” is well understood as meaning that the person of whom it is said is one of the infernal fraternity. Indeed, in talking of persons who are addicted to magical arts, it is reckoned highly imprudent to speak of them as “_sorciers_” or “_sorcières_,” or to call them by the now almost-forgotten name of “Quéraud.”[164] By so doing you give offence, and, what is of still more consequence, you put it in their power to injure you. It is, however, quite safe to speak of them as “_gens du Vendredi_,”[165] or “_gens du hoc_.”[166]